Blocks & More Fun~

I am part of a block exchange on the HGTV quilting message board this year. We call ourselves 'Mystery Sisters' as the coordinator gave each of us the name/address of a participant to make and send a block a month.

We don't know who our 'mystery sister' is and the reveal isn't until December. To keep ourselves a secret we send our blocks to someone else to mail for us, use someone else's return address, etc.

It's fun!

The only rules were that we should stretch ourselves, and we could only use 5 fabrics to make all the blocks for our sister for the year. At the beginning we got to say what season, colors etc we would like, without choosing fabrics or manufacturer's. I said 'autumn' and I love getting these little surprises in the mail every month!

Here are my blocks so far~ 

 I have one extra because my sister chose to send the 2 leaf blocks since one is the reverse of the other. I am already dreaming about how I will put my quilt together. LOL

doesn't it make you feel cooler to just look at it? :-)

Switching gears, I can now tell you about another little project I did with my Mom

while I was visiting.  She has a lot of fun purses, some I've made, one she won, others she has purchased.  They don't always have inside pockets~ or at least enough inside pockets. ;-)

And she wanted something she could easily move from one bag to another that would hold most of the necessary purse items.

So I played! :-)

Going by her purse sizes etc, I made a purse insert for her. And then tweaked it a bit.

These are two we made~

I also made a smaller version, but forgot to take a photo.. or Mom dashed it off too fast to her purse! ;-)  We had a lot of fun sewing together! :-)  Usually I cut and sew (since she has a machine just like mine) and she would do the pressing and occasional ripping. :-o Ok, ok, I ripped sometimes too! LOL

Now I need to decipher my notes and make one for myself since we didn't get that far. ;-)

Hope you are having a happy stitchin' day~

Until next time,

may all your stitches be straight! ;-)

A Little Gift~

Anna from Noodlehead created the cutest little manicure bag for Robert Kaufman fabrics.. 

its called the Snappy Mani Pouch and its  free on their site!  :-)

I knew I would be making one (or more) as soon as I saw the pattern and printed it right out.

Well, other projects got in the way and then vacation, and then finally! I made one!

DD's birthday is this week, so that was my 'kick-in-the-pants'! :-)

I did make one change in the placement of the velcro.

The nail polish bottles I purchased were taller, so I needed to make the bag a little bigger

to accommodate the polish and  buffer. It was easy~ just move the velcro on the bottom closer to the edge of the pouch. ;-)

I'm just tickled with it and have plans to make myself one... soon! LOL

Until next time~

Happy Stitchin'!

A Quilt Show~

While I was gone in June, I was able to attend the Heartland Quilters Guild Show in Mitchell, SD. 

This may be a small guild~ but they blow me away with their talent!

Sara is a member, and so is my Mom. :-)

The funny thing is that I met Sara through blogging first. :-)

Now I look forward to seeing her when I visit my parents.

She made this very cool SD placemat for a door prize~~

and I won!!! :-) 

I still can't believe I won! :-)

The members made things for door prizes~ just look at all the prizes they gave away!

And that is just on the wall! My placemat and a lot of other things were on the table tops.

I didn't take photo's of all the quilts, but I wanted to show you a couple. This one won best of show, by A.

A close up~

Isn't is a beauty? She does her own longarm quilting too. :-)

And this cutie is by L~

And she made a mini to go with it! It is hand embroidered and I think hand quilted too.

There are a good number of hand quilters in their guild and it is a good thing most

of the quilts were hung up!~  They were all drool-worthy! ;-)

     I think this might be one of Sara's quilts (?). I love stars!

And P made a whole quilt of yo-yo's! :-o

Isn't it amazing?!!

The ladies in the guild are all so nice~ they made me a honorary member...

or maybe they just said that so I'd work a shift as a white glove lady. ;-)

I didn't mind a bit~ it was so much fun! 

That's all for today~

Until next time~

Happy stitchin'!!

More Vacation Sewing~

This is Kim's pattern~ Tote Along Tool Caddy.

I made it for my Mom a few years ago, and a friend of her's fell in love. :-)

So I made this one for her friend, Donna, while I was visiting. 

I did make a couple alterations to Kim's pattern. I added a little flap to the back pocket, 

and a zipper on top.

I overheard Donna tell mt Mom~ 'my bag

is prettier than your bag!' LOL :-) Uh-oh! ;-)

I'm sorry I didn't get this posted sooner, because when I was looking for a link to Kim's blog, I saw she had her patterns on sale. :-o  Oops! 

I'll be back soon with a few quilts from the show I saw. 

Until next time~

Happy Quilting!!

Home Sewing~

If you read my last post~

I am disappointed, my McD's did not have any of the little sewing machines. :-(

I hope you had better luck!

Home Sewing~ I'll bet you

are thinking 'what kind of a title is that?!' ;-)

Well, every time I go to visit my parents, my Mom and I choose a project to work on..

so I was 'sewing' at their 'home'. ;-)

This time we chose the Beatle Bag.  We found the

pattern at one of the quilt show vendors and thought what fun!

Viola! Matching bags! :-)

The black strip of velcro is where a pincushion attaches. We didn't have them stuffed when I took the photo. I did make some minor adjustments to the pattern, and had to do a bit of ripping when the directions weren't very clear; but overall we are happy with our new bags. :-)  

I brought back all kinds of fun things in my bag~ more rings,

some fish hooks I found, etc. Eventually I will clean it out and use it for my 

portable embroidery bag. ;-)

I still haven't gotten the quilt show photo's off the camera~ it seems like the

days are just flying! But I'll try to get them re-sized this weekend,

and be back.

Hope you have a lovely week, and a happy 4th!

Until next time~

Happy stitchin'!!

Home Again! Home Again!

Jiggety-Jig! LOL  Remember that childhood poem? or am I really dating myself? :-)

We took most of June and visited our familes in SD.

I thought I might be able to post while gone, but that didn't work out. :-o

I have much to share!! :-)

But first I need to get my laundry done, photo's resized etc.

So in the mean time I want you to go visit Missie~

She blogs at ~~Traditional Primitives~~

Just look at what she found!

~photo borrowed from Missie~

Isn't that just the cutest?! I was in a couple McD's and never spotted them! :-(

I've got my fingers crossed to win one from Missie ;-) But if I don't~ maybe you will?

I'll be back soon!

Have a happy weekend!!

June!!

Are you as shocked as I am that it is June already??

Where did May go? :-)

For me, it was spent cooking~ DS is home from college. LOL

I forgot how important meals can be! ;-)

And I did get some sewing done, but not much~

more time was spent outside with my flowers. :-)

I finally caught myself up with Pam Buda's Market Day Sew-Along.

This is Steps 5 and 6~

As I was doing the HST's I snapped a photo of a quick trick.

When I only have a couple HST's to do, I cut the squares and draw the line

and sew on either side. I'm sure you probably do that too?

But, I keep a big nail file with my sewing supplies for this step~

It works great to hold the fabric to draw the lines. No wiggling out from

under the ruler at the corner. :-)

 

 

Do you have some things that don't necessarily belong in your sewing box, but

work great? I'd love to hear your tips and hints!

 

Happy June!!